XL] THE BATANTA PAPUANS. 257 



women I cannot speak, as they were kept carefully out of our sight. 

 The only tattooing that adorned their dark chocolate-brown bodies 

 consisted in a few raised moxa-produced marks upon the chest, 

 whose meaning, if they had any, we did not discover. In Dorei 

 Bay they were a mark of distinction, only borne by those who had 

 been on voyages or expeditions against their enemies. 



The Papuan tj'pe is, on the whole, by no means a bad one, the 

 jaw being far less prognathous than in the African negro, and the 

 lips much thinner. The muscles of the leg, however, as in the 

 latter people, are very ill-developed, though the foot is but little 



WOODEN IXSTEUJIEXT FOR STIRRING SAGO. 



spur-heeled. One characteristic of the race has not, as far as I 

 know, iDeen remarked upon — the peculiar odour attaching to the 

 individual. This is quite sui rjencris, so far as my experience of 

 natives goes, and utterly unlike that of the African. There would 

 not be the smallest difficultv in recognising them in the dark 

 merely by the sense of smell. 



The ornaments of the Batanta Papuans were limited. They 

 wore shell bracelets made from the Tridacna or Conus, and tight 

 armlets of finely plaited grass, two or tlu'ee inches in width, above 

 the biceps. These served in lieu of pockets, for beneath them 

 they tucked any little article they obtained from us, or their 

 cigarettes, which, like the ordinary Malay rohos, were rolled in the 

 delicate young leaf of some species of palm. One or two firebrands 

 at which to light them were carried in every canoe. The canoes 

 were outrigged on both sides, and provided in the bows with 

 VOL. II. s 



